Comparative Pollen Spectra of Tetragonisca Angustula (Apidae, Meliponini) from the Lower Amazon (N Brazil) and Caatinga (NE Brazil) Jaílson S
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Comparative pollen spectra of Tetragonisca angustula (Apidae, Meliponini) from the Lower Amazon (N Brazil) and caatinga (NE Brazil) Jaílson S. de Novais, Ana Cristina A. Garcêz, Maria Lúcia Absy, Francisco de Assis R. dos Santos To cite this version: Jaílson S. de Novais, Ana Cristina A. Garcêz, Maria Lúcia Absy, Francisco de Assis R. dos Santos. Comparative pollen spectra of Tetragonisca angustula (Apidae, Meliponini) from the Lower Ama- zon (N Brazil) and caatinga (NE Brazil). Apidologie, Springer Verlag, 2015, 46 (4), pp.417-431. 10.1007/s13592-014-0332-z. hal-01284456 HAL Id: hal-01284456 https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-01284456 Submitted on 7 Mar 2016 HAL is a multi-disciplinary open access L’archive ouverte pluridisciplinaire HAL, est archive for the deposit and dissemination of sci- destinée au dépôt et à la diffusion de documents entific research documents, whether they are pub- scientifiques de niveau recherche, publiés ou non, lished or not. The documents may come from émanant des établissements d’enseignement et de teaching and research institutions in France or recherche français ou étrangers, des laboratoires abroad, or from public or private research centers. publics ou privés. Apidologie (2015) 46:417–431 Original article * INRA, DIB and Springer-Verlag France, 2014 DOI: 10.1007/s13592-014-0332-z Comparative pollen spectra of Tetragonisca angustula (Apidae, Meliponini) from the Lower Amazon (N Brazil) and caatinga (NE Brazil) 1,2 1 2 Jaílson S. de NOVAIS , Ana Cristina A. GARCÊZ , Maria Lúcia ABSY , 3 Francisco de Assis R. dos SANTOS 1Centro de Formação Interdisciplinar and Laboratório de Botânica Taxonômica, Universidade Federal do Oeste do Pará, Rua Vera Paz, s/n, Salé, 68035-110, Santarém, Pará, Brazil 2Laboratório de Palinologia, Coordenação de Biodiversidade, Instituto Nacional de Pesquisas da Amazônia, Av. André Araújo, 2.936, Petrópolis, 69067-375, Manaus, Amazonas, Brazil 3Laboratório de Micromorfologia Vegetal, Departamento de Ciências Biológicas, Universidade Estadual de Feira de Santana, Av. Transnordestina, s/n, 44036-900, Feira de Santana, Bahia, Brazil Received 18 January 2014 – Revised 26 September 2014 – Accepted 21 October 2014 Abstract – Tetragonisca angustula is a stingless bee species widely distributed in Brazil. Past studies have shown a rich native flora supplying this meliponine with pollen and nectar. The aim of this study was to compare the food provisions of T. angustula in two areas in the Lower Amazon mesoregion in the state of Pará and two areas of caatinga vegetation in the state of Bahia, Brazil. We used a published data set of 57 samples of honey and 46 samples of pollen stored in colonies of T. angustula . The honeys from the Lower Amazon and from the caatinga displayed 23 and 16 pollen types with frequency higher than >10 %, respectively, with emphasis on the families Fabaceae, Solanaceae, and Urticaceae. In the pollen stored samples, 18 and 11 pollen types were found, respectively. Cluster analyses (Dice similarity) performed with these published pollen spectra of the honeys grouped the samples from each geographic region with higher similarity than the analyses performed with the pollen spectra of the stored pollen. cluster analysis / Dice similarity / entomopalynology / honey / melissopalynology / pollen stored / stingless bees 1. INTRODUCTION distributed in time and space (Fisch et al. 1998). In contrast, the seasonally dry forests of the The Amazon Forest and the caatinga (dry for- caatinga encompass different mosaics of vegeta- est) together form more than 5 million km2, equiv- tion subjected to a rigorous precipitation deficit alent to approximately 60 % of the Brazilian terri- (Prado 2003). Disturbances in both of these biomes tory (IBGE 2004). The Amazon Forest, extending have threatened native bee populations and hin- over eight Latin-American countries in addition to dered the environmental services provided by them Brazil, is the largest tropical rainforest of the planet, (Freitas et al. 2009; Maia-Silva et al. 2012). with a high precipitation level irregularly Recently, in independent palynological studies, we investigated the pollen spectra of honey and Electronic supplementary material The online version of pollen stored by Tetragonisca angustula (Latreille, this article (doi:10.1007/s13592-014-0332-z) contains 1811) (Apidae: Meliponini) from Amazonian supplementary material, which is available to authorized (Novais and Absy 2013; Novais and Absy in users. press)andcaatinga (Novais et al. 2013, 2014) Corresponding author: J. Novais, areas. [email protected] In this manuscript, we performed a compara- Manuscript editor: James Nieh tive palynological analysis of the food provisions 418 J.S. de Novais et al. of T. angustula basedonthepublisheddatamen- honey and pollen, respectively) and Ruy Barbosa (14 tioned above. The data on the pollen types found and 13 samples)] (Novais and Absy 2013; Novais et al. has been previously published but not qualitative- in press; Novais and Absy 2013, 2014). ly compared. With this study, we compiled the The protocol for the collection of material, the data set of plants foraged by T. angustula in two laboratory procedures adopted, and the qualitative biomes (Amazon and caatinga ) and also perform and quantitative palynological analysis performed a cluster analysis aiming to better understand the were previously described by Novais and Absy similarity of pollen diet of this species in different (2013) and Novais and Absy (2013). The technique regions in Brazil, one wet and another dry. of acetolysis (Erdtman 1960) was used to process all the samples. For the purpose of this study, a sample 2. MATERIALS AND METHODS consists of 5 mL of honey or 2–3gofstoredpollen, collected from one colony of T. angustula in each 2.1. Study sites study site. After chemical processing, four glass slides were prepared and at least 500 pollen grains We used data obtained from four study sites: two per sample were identified and quantified. From located in the Lower Amazon mesoregion (Pará State, these data, the following frequency classes were NBrazil)andtwoareasinthecaatinga (Bahia State, established, as proposed by Louveaux et al. (1978): NE Brazil) (Figure 1). Further information about these predominant pollen (>45 % of the grains counted in – areas can be found in Novais and Absy (2013) and a sample), secondary pollen (16 45 %), important – Novais et al. (2013, 2014). minor pollen (3 15 %), and minor pollen (<3 %). 2.2. Collection, laboratory processing, and 2.3. Comparative analysis palynological analysis Comparative analysis was performed with the pollen In total, 103 samples were studied: 57 samples of spectra obtained, considering only the pollen types with honey and 46 samples of pollen stored by T. angustula . frequencies higher than 10 % in at least one of the The samples were collected in between September 2010 samples analyzed because these types represent the and January 2012 in the study sites of the Lower most significant floral resources for the bees (Ramalho Amazon [Belterra (16 and 15 samples of honey and et al. 1985). We have not included in this analysis pollen pollen, respectively) and Santarém (14 and 8 samples)] types which frequencies were lower than 10 % in all and in the caatinga [Itaberaba (13 and 10 samples of samples. Figure 1. Location of the study sites in the Lower Amazon (map to the left ) and in the caatinga (map to the right ). In the map of the South America, in the center, Brazil is colored in gray, with emphasis on the states of Pará, in the north region, and Bahia, in the northeast region. The municipalities where the study was performed are represented by letters : A Santarém, B Belterra, C Ruy Barbosa, D Itaberaba. Melissopalynology of Amazon and caatinga 419 We performed a cluster analysis, using the Dice In total, the honeys from the Amazonian study similarity coefficient (McCune and Grace 2002), sites displayed 23 representative pollen types, to evaluate the formation of groups among the representing 15 botanical families. In decreasing samples studied based on the pollen types identi- order, Warszewiczia coccinea , Microtea , fied in the samples. For the honeys, the 57 sam- Byrsonima , Cecropia ,andBorreria verticillata ples and the 36 pollen types identified were con- occurred in more than 50 % of the samples sidered for the presence–absence data matrix (Figure 2a). In the honeys from the caatinga ,16 (Hammer et al. 2001). Similarly, for the stored pollen types and 11 botanical families were re- pollen, the 46 samples and the 29 pollen types corded, from which Prosopis juliflora , Solanum , identified were used for the data matrix. Heteropterys ,andSchinus were the most com- Therefore, we evaluated the presence of structured monly observed pollen types (Figure 2b). patterns, considering the period of collection and The pollen stored samples from the the different sampling areas. This analysis consid- Amazonian study sites, in contrast, displayed ered only the presence of the pollen types in the 18 representative pollen types, representing individual samples, disregarding the absence of a 17 botanical families. The pollen types given pollen type as an indication of similarity. Cecropia and B. verticillata occurred in The similarity analysis was performed with the more than 50 % of the samples (Figure 3a). software PAST—PAlaeontological STatistics , ver- The pollen stored samples from the caatinga sion 2.16 (Hammer et al. 2001). The climatic data revealed 11 pollen types and seven botanical of